Unfaithfulness and self reflection

Ghosts of projects past.

I really thought living in a temporary home would make me very faithful to my WIPs. In hindsight, I guess I should have known better. Can't teach an old dog to sit and all that jazz. I finished the projects I brought- well done so far good girl have a biscuit. Then I kinda started slipping... I bought the lace yarn and thought that I would be content with that and also I was gifted some sock yarn(and bought some additional yarn, but that doesn't count) but I find myself spending LOTS of time on Ravelry dreaming away, scanning through blogs and thinking that I wanna do all those stuff right now and surfing of yarn store web pages almost feeling the yarn in my (longing) hands.
I just have to face it. I'm an unfaithful, poly-knitter. I just cant keep myself to a single project at a time- I'm not wired that way. I just have to accept it.

Right now I want to make another vintage sweater. Maybe in light blue.

Because I'm worth it

A color who just wont be caught on film. Pretty much like the Bigfoot.

I bought some yarn. Just because I felt like it. Oh yeah....
Squishy, soft, pretty Malabrigo Lace in the colors Tortuga (which is SO awesome, I fell in love instantly) and Black. It's going to be a Cladonia although I'm not too sure if it's the best pattern my colors since they aren't very contrasting to one another. For that reason I skipped the stripey part and decided to make the main part in Tortuga ans the lace part in Black. With these colors it CAN'T be ugly, right?
Also, I got the wrong needle, but the need has no law as we say in Sweden.

One sock, one love

Yay! The first of my Pomatomus socks! It's awesome! For some reason I cant get the hang of the spelling or pronunciation of the word "Pomatomus", I seem to spell or say it different ways every time. Pomotomus, Pomatumus, Poumatomus, Pomotomos, yadda yadda...
As a dedicated knitter with brand new yarn in her hands, I started a new pair of socks right away. They will be a bit made up as I go along, and the pattern will mainly be based on a pair of wristwarmers I did years back called X-knit halvmittens . They will be very thick and warm...

Great heal!

Temporary home and temporary knitting

Ear warmer cat in our temp home.

Yeah, so for different reasons I had to make a very fast change of location. I now live in a spare room with a couple of my (ever so supporting!) friends. Amelia is with me, and tries to get along with the resident cat who is very suspicios. Good thing about bribes though, everything seems to be alright with a little foody bribery. Wiskey is currently living with a friend in another city, I really hope they get along, but they probably do.

The Grace is done! Except for the fastening of threads and adding of buttons, which will have to wait.

I had to pack almost all of my yarn and wont be able to touch it for about a month. I only got the Grace cardigan and one of the Pomotomus socks with me- the yarn for sock no 2 is unfortunately in there somewhere. Oh, poor me. No yarn. So I had to buy some. You see the reason in that, right? A girl simply must knit!

A Pomotomus sock in the making!

We are ok, though, and it's for a short while. The good things out of this is that I really realized what amazing friends I have, and how supportive they are. I would never have imagined beforehand. And I get to buy yarn, there is that!

Oh, and thanks for all the support! <3 br="">

When life happens...

Hi y'all.
So... No posts for a few days. And it probably will stay that way for a while. Life happened to me. It's quite messy, so I wont go into detail, but I probably wont post very much for a while. At least I got to start on my Pomatomus socks, and they are RAD!
When in trouble, hold tightly on to some yarn. (I will be back)

Your socks are like pools of springs!

And they are done. I will be a good girl after this and keep the recommended gauge. Maybe. The pattern is really pretty though, but I would recommend a yarn for the Spring Pool Socks that defines it a bit more than the rather loosely spun Delight. Really clever heal and gusset as well. When I started I thought it was a bit overly complicated, but it's actually rather brilliant.
For the moment I am so stoked on sock knitting that I want to start another pair right away. Next I will battle the Pomatomus socks .
I also noted that Arga Stickaren posted a new sock pattern, called Crocus . It's only in Swedish
unfortunately, but I will probably knit me a pair, since it seems like a perfect pattern for the leftovers of which you have heard me whining that I have lots of.

First sock down!

The first of my Spring Pool Socks are done. It's really nice but what was that thing about gauge again? I seem to remember something about if you knit a sport weight pattern in a lace weight yarn with smaller needles the outcome will be, well, smaller. This sock are really tight. I almost can't get it on my foot. But that's almost, it still fits in only barely, I will knit another one and think of them as a pair of socks that will not be saggy after some wear and tear.

Some pools of springs.

The pattern is a bit tricky, and a bit easy to get lost in. I would not knit these while chatting with other people of watching something engaging.

Lantern Festival Cowl

Weeeeeeee! It's finished! And it's sooooo cool! My Lantern Festival Cowl is done, and neatly so. I had to invent some rather creative methods for blocking since this baby wanted to be gently stretched out in the round. I made it easy for myself and rolled a couple of towels together, pulled the cowl over them and then pinned the edges. The blocking was very important for the finish in this one...

I use Sandnes Lanette in dark grey as a base color and Zauberball Crazy in Indisch Rosa as a pattern color. From the first yarn I used aprox 1.9 skeins and the second about half so not very much yarn was acquired. It also means I have even more leftovers for the sock challange....

The pattern was very well written, easy to follow and with a great chart. Do not try this if you haven't knitted a fair bit of stranded knitting before though, you really need to be able to keep a even tension through it all. Stretchy yarns probably help. And some blocking.

It got a great fit too. I usually feel most cowls are too big but this one is really snug and cozy. Too bad winter is over, not that it's too warm for this baby yet but it soon will be....

Some general fooling around is needed.

Challange accepted!

Polly Jean matching my new skirt.

Ok! I give in! I can't take it anymore. I will join Dödergöks sockutmaning too. After taking a good long look at my Polly Jean socks and thinking that I want more neat socks like that, and having a pep talk with Ulliganen and Stick å brinn! I am caving in to the temptation....

My goals: I will knit up the leftovers and not so inspiring sock yarns that I have. And make Pomatomus socks since I have been dreaming about them for so long and even have the yarn aimed for them. And maybe a pair of stranded socks in a cool pattern since my Ravelry favorite list is full of them. And I will maybe try to knit a pair of vintage socks, because it sounds like something I would enjoy.
Yeah. That will be all I challange myself to do. A girl has to live as well.

I went for it straight away and cast on a pair of Spring Pools in black-blue-white Drops Delight. I don't really like the yarn, but I'm sure I will like the socks a lot.

A challanger appears

The awesome Dödergök started a sock challenge. Start date: april, finish: september. Goal: To knit socks. As many as you want/need/can. Maybe from yarn you already have at home, maybe not. It's up to you how you want to challenge yourself.
Aaaand I am really tempted. I always need socks, I like knitting socks, I have some yarns that are waiting. But LIFE has taught me that I usually have tons of stuff I want/need/must do and that I should be careful with joining things just because I feel like it at the time without having thought things through. They feeling on wanting to join in on the fun times sometimes overwhelm me. And honestly, there are a lot of things I am currently working on, and other things than socks that I would like to knit.  I know the sock challenge isn't about feeling pressured at all, but I know myself and I would just end up feeling guilty about knitting anything else. And I don't want that. I want my knitting to be completely guilt free.
So I will make the very grown up decision and pass this one. I can knit socks anyway. 

A song about mittens (and kittens)

I laughed my mittens off.

Yarn and Tea!

I have been participation in Stickameras swap called Yarn and Tea 9. Some days ago I sent a yarn to a hopefully happy reciver, and today I got a package of my own! Oh, happy days! Some really yummy alpaca-silk, some bamboo, some sweet smelling teas and a small magazine with patterns.
I'm pretty sure the alpaca-silk will be a pair of halfmittens, but I might have to squeeze it and think for a bit first....

Endless stockinette

I am past the lace part of the Grace Cardigan . Now it's endless rows and rows of stockinette. However, I am so looking forward to this cardigan.

Lots of Lanterns

This cowl and me, it's a lovestory in the making. The pattern alone, fiddly, a bit neverending  but how fun it is to see the lanterns, tassels and stars grow under your fingers! The pattern is called Lantern Festival Cowl an is simply mindboggling.

I am knitting it with Sandnes Lanette as a base color and Shoppelwolle Zauberball Crazy as a lantern color. The fading colors in the yarn turns rather nicely out in the project. The same designer (Thea Eischliman) has made lots of nice stranded patterns, and I kinda want to try them all.

Knitting 1914- 2014 University of Southampton

Knitting 1914- 2014 University of Southampton

Wow. Just look at the video above. I really wish I could go and see this exhibition. It seems awesome.

And they have an archive too, I love archives!

http://www.southampton.ac.uk/intheloop/knittingcollections.html

Real life Alpacas!

A couple of friends of mine are keeping lots of Alpacas and fill up my Facebook- feed with furry, fuzzy cuteness. I have kinda been wondering what they do with all the fur, because you know; really soft locally bread and born fuzzy fur= awesome yarn. Today I found out that they are actually selling it through their webshop, Kullholen . No gauge, and no yardage, but yarn that begs to be experimented with! They also sell feathers from their birds, which they have lots of. The webpage is in Swedish, but if you don't speak the language, just ask (they speak English) them because they are really nice people and surely will help you.

So fuzzy!

Procrastination, no more.

Good mentors are the best thing. I just got my head sorted out for my spring paper and now I'm on it again after being slightly overwhelmed for a while by the sheer complexity of history. You know, it's not the straight line with little dots at regular intervals you learned in school- reality is way more complicated. Lots of things intersect with each other and morph into new phenomenons and structures. I kinda like it being this way, it feels very human for history to be so complicated and messy, but it's also a bit of a bugger because it makes it so hard to pin things down.

Another tricky thing is the Grace Cardigan. The lace part looks alluringly easy, but what's very easy is how easy it is to make a mistake and not realize it until a couple of rows later. And this is not the kind of cardigan you will be able to just frog a bit and then pick up again, the lace part goes all wonky. It's just frog the whole deal and start over.... I only had to frog it once this time (I have knitted one of these before) and have now passed the fiddly lacepart and just have endless rows of stockinette in front of me.

And I might meet my bf:s parents tonight, for the first time. How scary is that?!

The rise of the FrankenCat

The morning begun without even a sneaking suspicion from Whiskey that the day would evolve into something dramatic and horrible. If he had known, I strongly suspect he would have peed in my bed or something like that, just to make a point beforehand.
He was working hard on his "being really annoying to make The Female take of that stupid cone"- routine so that he could scratch that itch in his ear and go out again to kick that other cats butt.
Poor kitty never saw it coming...
Me on the other hand had decided that the situation of his ear probably was out of my hands and needed to be seen to by a vet. In to a carrier he went, wildly protesting and off to the Vet. The Vet told me that this was deep and that they needed to keep him for some hours to patch him up.

I forgot my own knitting at home. Would you belive it?!

During this time I managed to borrow some yarn and needles from a friend who was kind enough to be the designated driver of this whole ordeal. Some wrist warmers in a really soft yellow and wine red yarn are in the making.

Rubber antennae satelite cat. He gets more space-y every day.

Later on we went home, me and a heavily drugged cat who for all I knew hallucinated about the zombie apocalypse, at least he was behaving that way. It was kinda scary. The only was to keep him relatively calm and not try to walk or jump was to hold him tightly and stroke his back. He has two rubber drainage thingies sticking out from his head, and he got his teeth cleaned when they were at it and had the whole 5,5 kg (yep, he is a big boy) cat under sedation, so he now drools heavily. Guess who has to wipe that up? Well, I don't mind. I feel kinda sorry for him, he is going to be fine and all, but I can't really explain that to him.

Oh, well. On to new yarny depths, with FrankenCat by my side.

Gecko Green Ginko

To be quite honest I have no idea of the color of a Gecko lizard. Some kind of green, hardly this viivd bright one, but it made a fun headline.
The Ginko Shoulderette Shawl is done, and it's a bright reminder of the teaser spring we had/have that after some promising alluringly sunny days turned back into snowy winter. I know this kind of weather is expected in this place of the world, but nevertheless it's a bit of a disappointment.

Something that is NOT a disappointment is this knitting. Great pattern with good instructions for how to make it bigger (or smaller) and an interesting double sided lace part that came out as pretty ginko leaves. I think mine didn't become as clear as they could be, if you want your ginko leaves to really stand out I would recommend a hard spun sock yarn, not mohair.
No matter, I think it's really pretty the way it is.

An intruder/attentionseeker in a cone again.

My one is bit bigger then the original, I knitted stockinette until row 107 when I started the lace part. It came out as a good sized shawl, rather then a shoulderette. Not a huge one, but not small either.
I used aprox 1.7 balls of ONlinie 253 Hommage color and an unknown amount of some kind of 2-ply lace yarn I got in a swap way back. The subtle color changes in the mohair yarn made the color of the shawl almost shimmering, the effect really was pretty.
Also, remember to BO really loosely so that you can get the pretty edges.

A bit of Meh and a lot of Wants.

I'm having a period where the only thing I really feel like doing is sitting around, knitting and maybe listening to some music. It's making it really difficult to get something else done, you know- that whole being a responsible grown up- part. The cats are making their part to keep things this way too, Whiskey has once again been out fighting and got his ear bitten and infected, and Amelia is just really clingy and cuddly.
There is really tons of projects I would love to do, another vintage cardigan, the Lantern Festival Cowl or anything by Thea Eschliman . Or the Sherlock lives cardigan in some pretty colors. Yes, I'm kinda hooked on stranded knitting for the moment, I love to see the patterns growing.
The other day I cast on another Grace Cardigan , this one for myself in black Cascade Fingering. I can never have too many black cardigans, I can't see that happening. I need a torch to find anything in my wardrobe, and proud of it!

A little stranded

Oh, and I made another baby cardigan on leftovers. I still have a pile of leftovers that could be something...

I don't even know what to do with the cardigans. I'm not preggers, no one I know are and no one have a baby that would fit in one of these cardigans for aprox 3 months olds. Ah, the daily knitting problems...

The obstinate pile.

The magic of mixing yarns

I have had these yarns in my stash for a rather long time. One (the mohair, ONlinie 253 Hommage color) comes from a awesome LYS called Kecathu and the other one (laceyarn, wool, no label) comes from a swap at a knitting café. Some time ago I happened to place them next to each other and magic happened. Since then I have been looking for a great pattern for this magic and found it in Ginko Shoulderette Shawl . The Ginko Shawl does also exist as a cresent shape, if you are not too keen on the triangular. Search for Ginko Cresent, and you will find it.

Recipe for magic.

There has been some outdoors knitting going on with this project, since the spring and warmth is beginning to show it's face. Only today when I woke up, the world was white again. The cat that likes to be outdoors gave me a not too pleased look of disbelief when I let him out. I could only be so sympathetic and offer a warm spot when he was done outside.

Some days ago. Glorious, glorious sun.

Long overdue tweed cardigan

Yeah, it's the same session as the last post. And the same garden gnome.

When I had my birthday I started knitting a cardigan from a Rowan pattern in some Rowan Yarn. I had some reservations about the pattern, Cressida but it was one of those "Looks really good on the picture. In reality? No idea". It all worked out in the end, and I knew what I was getting myself into, sorta. The yarn is Rowans Fine Tweed, by the way, a really lovely yarn.

I have this to say about Rowans patterns. Lots of them are well written, have interesting takes and they have awesome yarns to go with. But then there is the fit. I don't get why they are all so ill fitting?! Specially the sleeves, and it's not like they even are great for people with larger sizes either, because it escalates. Not in a "trendy, oversized, really comfortable" way, more in a "we thought it might be a good idea to give you room to grow double size in case you want to" way. Maybe it's just me, but there it is.
If you want to knit Cressida, be aware that you probably can use a slightly smaller size than your measurements, and add some to the length if you like. It will not be too tight, I promise.

Well, we get along more or less, the cardigan and I. I will add a few cm to the bottom sleeves to make them longer and to keep them together more.
Oh, by the way. A new issue of Knitty.com is out. There is octopus socks. Just saying.

Zig Zag vintage Cardigan and the importance of a good photographer

No garden gnomes was hurt during the taking of these pics. It already was melted.

OOOOhhh! It's done! I feel like jumping up and down and running around in circles, that is how excited I am over this one. It turned out sooo pretty! The yarn had to have a good soak in water and conditioner to stop being itchy, but now it's really nice.
The bust is a little too big for me, it would fit some one with aprox 90-100 cm. Again, if anyone wants to buy this piece, send me a email at knitting.ozelote@gmail.com
I really should get an Etzy account if I go on like this.

These really great pictures was taken by my close friend who after this NEVER will get rid of me, and who has been appointed royal photographer. I hope he has lots of patience, but we have known each other a long time... Good pictures makes all the difference in the world. Remember me bitching about the color of this cardigan in my last post, and how hard it was to get a proper picture of it? Well, this is spot on.

Yeah, my neck is shaven.

Out of the dark

We have spring! And it's wonderful. For someone who comes from a part of the world where the seasons are more similar it might be difficult to understand the Scandinavians feelings towards the spring, but this part of the earth has been very dark, cold and grimy for the last half year so the feel of warm(er) winds and the sun against your face is awesome. Just don't look in a mirror, everyone looks like ghosts, and not pretty ones that is...

Knitted stuff looks great in the sun too. Here's one of my favorite shawls. In the sun.

The very complicated color

Blocked and unblocked pieces.

The 1947 zig zag cardigan is soon done. It's just some sewing left to do. The only problem I'm having is that it's that kind of green that is so darn difficult to get a proper  picture of. I have tried in lots of lights and so on, and it always come out different, but never close to correct. These pics are all modified, to get a better idea of the actual and very annoying color.

The zig zag pattern changed a whole lot when blocked, and my initial reaction was "Meh.", but I think it will come out really nice when done. The blocked result looks much tidier and neater anyway, and more like the picture in the magazine.

Perfect buttons!